CHAPTER XI
The Joy of Story-Telling
Did you ever drop down upon a somewhat sleepy village where recreations and amusements are almost unknown, and there gather the children together and give them a story hour?
They come with wonder, even with suspicion that you have some ulterior object as yet undisclosed, and they file in and eye you askance.
And then you begin to tell the stories—animal stories, for all children love those; a story from the Bible which reveals to them the fact that there are as great heroes among the Bible characters as are to be found in secular history; a tale of chivalry which stirs the boys; and then perhaps a dialect story from Uncle Remus;—and as you tell the stories the suspicious look vanishes; the clear eyes before you look straight into yours; then there creeps into them a brightness, an eagerness for more; then comes the ripple of merriment; a spontaneous ring of laughter; and then the plea, “One more, oh, please, one more!”
When you have done this; when you have won to you the shy children of a whole village, then you know the pure joy of story-telling.
There is nothing better worth winning than the love of a child, and there is no surer way of reaching a child’s heart than through the story.
The Story Hour
Story-telling may be made a serious matter as to its purpose, but it should never be a serious matter as to its presentation. Whatever its purpose, the story itself must be a source of joy to the hearer, or its purpose fails. The lesson to be taught, whether moral or educational, fails in its object if the story itself be irksome or stupid.
Conscientious teachers, feeling the weight of argument against them, and taking up the task of story-telling as an added obligation of schoolroom duty, wonder why the results are not what the evidence of other story-tellers had led them to believe. Story-telling, as a duty, unlightened and unbrightened by a genuine love of the story and an eagerness for the joy it is to bring to the listeners, can never prove a success.
The story-teller must enter with all her heart and all her enthusiasm into the life and beauty of the story she is telling, in order to achieve the best results. Without this she cannot win the response of her hearers, nor reap the reward which should be her own.